Below is the 1993 Court Martial Appeal Court of Canada decision related to a Leading Seaman George Z.
LS Z. molested three female underage children while he was stationed at Canadian Forces Base Lahr in Germany.
The CMAC indicates that LS Z. has a daughter of his own, and was separated from his wife.
As LS Z was a member of the Canadian Armed Forces and was on active duty he was dealt with through the military justice system.
And the court martial that led to this court martial appeal shows two issues with the jurisdiction of the Canadian Armed Forces justice system
The first issue being that the military did in fact prosecute their members through the military tribunals for civilian criminal code offences such as child sexual abuse. This means also that it would have been LS Z.’s commanding officer that reviewed the charges brought against LS Z. As I’ve mentioned before, and as was discussed during the Somlia affair inquiry, these commanding officers were not trained in the law, they were not lawyers, and they would often let their own parochial interests get in the way of justice for the victims.
The second issue being that even though the offences occurred in Germany, the court martial occurred in Ottawa, Ontario and not overseas in Germany on CFB Lahr. If the CAF could wait until LS Z. was returned to Canada, why didn’t the CAF just hand LS Z. over to the civilian courts where he would have faced substantially harsher sentences, or where a civilian crown prosecutor could have reviewed the charges to make sure the LS Z. was in fact being charged with every offence that there was evidence for.
And this matter brings up the topic of liability.
The three victims in this matter. Did they ever receive compensation?
From my personal experience, the CAF has always been lousy with the care of military dependents. In fact it took years of pressure from the Canadian Forces Ombudsman to get the CAF and the DND to stop referring to us as “DF&E”, “Dependents, Furniture, and Effects” as if we were just the personal belongings of the service member.
The CAF, and the DND are ultimately responsible for the actions of LS Z.
They recruited him.
They vetted him.
They hired him.
They sent him and his daughter on a posting to a foreign country.
They provided living accommodations on a defence establishment.
They were responsible for the security of these defence establishments.
They exposed children located in Germany, potentially of other service members, to LS Z. Aren’t the CAF and the DND supposed to do full evaluations of their employees before sending them off to foreign postings outside of the country?
As LS Z. was a member of the regular forces, he was on the clock 24/7/365 from the day he enlisted until the day he left.
The court martial heard expert evidence that LS Z. suffered from a psychiatric condition called “heterosexual pedophilia” which involved sexual attraction to children. Why couldn’t the CAF or the DND detect this in their employee before he damaged three young children?
And much like in my matter when my father abused the Defence Establishment Trespass Regulations and had my mother thrown out of the military housing at Summerside, PEI, did LS Z. do the same thing with his ex-wife. This wasn’t an uncommon tactic as highlighted by the report released in 2000 that looked at spousal abuse in the Canadian Armed Forces. The Defence Establishment Trespass Regulations were practically green-lighting this behaviour.
And finally, and this is the one that upsets me the most, is somehow military service is somehow supposed to offset the severity of the damage from the abuse? Not only was LS Z.’s military service brought up during his court martial appeal, but Captain McRae’s military service was brought up during his court martial. Does the Canadian Armed Forces actually view child sexual abuse as such a low risk for long term emotional and psychological damage that just following orders for 10 years means more that ruining some kid’s life?
Beeshive 